Community resilience initiatives

Community resilience initiatives | Daily Tribune

After months of sputtering inquiries and political theater, the appointment of former Justice Secretary Boying Remulla as the new Ombudsman might finally inject some life into the drive for accountability over the flood control scandal.

Since the President’s vow in his July SoNA to hold the guilty to account, the story has lurched from revelation to resignation, from promise to paralysis. Now, with the Senate, the House, and even the so-called Independent Commission for Infrastructure (ICI) stuck in various stages of dysfunction, it may fall to Remulla to get the job done.

Remember how this all started. The President thundered about billions lost to corruption in flood control projects. The House and Senate dutifully launched investigations that, for a while, looked like they might actually go somewhere. Dramatic testimonies implicated senators, congressmen, and officials across the executive branch.

The fallout was swift and messy. Chiz Escudero and Martin Romualdez, both tagged by rumor and reportage as having links to the scandal, were forced out of their leadership posts. Congressman Zaldy Co resigned. Senators Joel Villanueva and Jinggoy Estrada were caught in a daily cycle of denial and damage control as angry Filipinos on social media picked apart their every statement.

Then came the predictable part. With public outrage peaking and the stench threatening to engulf them all, both chambers decided to pump the brakes. The House shut down its inquiry altogether. The Senate replaced its Blue Ribbon chair not once but twice while quietly letting the investigation go on break. The strategy was clear: stop fanning the flames before the whole institution burns down.

That left ICI as the supposed standard-bearer of reform. But the ICI quickly proved it was built on a shaky foundation. It has no real legal teeth, its leadership was riddled with questions about impartiality, and its stubborn refusal to hold public hearings made it look more like a damage-control operation than a transparency exercise.

By the time two of its key figures — retired Justice Andy Reyes and Baguio Mayor Benjie Magalong --- were fending off criticism (with Magalong eventually resigning) public confidence had all but evaporated.

Enter Boying Remulla. Unlike the Senate, the House, or the ICI, the Ombudsman doesn’t need to ask anyone’s permission to act. He can file criminal cases directly, and he can impose administrative penalties, including dismissal from office, without waiting for anyone else to grow a spine.

His declaration that he intends to secure convictions within four months may sound ambitious, but it’s exactly this show of decisiveness the public has been starving for.

Remulla has also promised to widen the scope of the investigation to include the Duterte years, when this whole sordid scheme first took root. If he makes good on that — and if his push to make officials’ SALNs more accessible leads to some long-overdue transparency — then maybe, just maybe, we’ll finally see some daylight pierce the dark clouds that have hovered over this issue from the start.

Yes, Remulla’s appointment is political. But politics is nothing new in this saga. What matters now is whether he can turn that political capital into results. The public has waded long enough through the murky waters of corruption. If the new Ombudsman can start clearing out the filth, he might just turn this whole sorry affair into something resembling real accountability.